Arvidnelson.com The online home of Arvid Nelson, writer of Rex Mundi & Zero Killer

Atget Lives

41 Rue Broca, 1912. Photo: Eugène Atget.

Eugène Atget is one of the best things I discovered through Rex Mundi. I first encountered him many moons ago, poking around The Strand bookstore in New York City for reference photos of Paris for EricJ. I pulled out a battered collection of Atget’s work, and the image on the front cover was better than perfect; it was my first window into the world of Rex Mundi.

Atget took photos of Paris in the late 1800s and early 1900s. They were tearing down the dark, cramped, medieval and riot-prone town at that time to re-make it into the city everyone knows, the city of Audrey Hepburn and Cary Grant.

Of course, something is always lost in "progress". That's what Atget captured. He'd go out very early in the morning and take pictures of the old neighborhoods before the steam shovels ground them up. Do a search for him and you might even recognize some backgrounds from Rex Mundi. And remnants of the old city still exist – there's a piece in the New York Times today showcasing some of surviving places where Atget took photos.

Most of the photos in the “le Journal de la Liberté” newspapers of Rex Mundi are Atget’s. Amazingly, there's a comic book store on the very street of one of the photos I used, at the end of Book One, chapter five. The store is called Arkham Comics, and Rex Mundi was their featured title of the week this week. Arkham’s a little down from the picture, seven Rue Broca.

Merci beacoup, mon amis d’Arkham. One of these days I'll make it back to Paris and stop in for a little guerrilla visit.

And I must give a shout out to the mysterious comte St. Germain, who told me about Arkham. The comte has a terrific French language pop culture blog. Check it out, whether or not you read French.